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I'm old enough to recall the glory days when it was illegal for pharmaceutical companies to directly advertise to consumers on television. The first drug commercial I remember is the one for Prozac, with the little animated circle-person looking all sad and being followed by a rain cloud. Then he/she takes a pill and befriends a happy blue bird.

My Google search informs me that this was, in fact, not an ad for Prozac but for Zoloft. So much for that, Pfizer.

Now it seems like you can't watch TV without coming across a drug commercial. In parallel with people driving in convertibles, sitting in bathtubs in flower fields, or Mike Ditka throwing a football through a tire is a voice-over person listing the potential side effects and risks which always seem to go on for days.

People living with chronic illnesses also live with chronic side effects. And they live with chronic risk for developing another, sometimes more serious, problem from their medications. My personal favo…

So I've had Crohn's disease since 2002. Unlike many of my peers, I've never had to go into the hospital. The only surgery I've had was done on an outpatient basis. My symptoms have never gotten to the this-is-super-bad level. Needless to say, I've been pretty fortunate.

Last week I had my first inpatient hospital experience, aside from having my kids. I didn't go in because of Crohn's disease, but because of a complication likely related to my medication. I'd been feeling really run down with a low grade fever for days but had no other symptoms other than some minor Crohn's activity that I barely considered a problem. My medication, Cimzia, has specific instructions not to take if you have an infection and I was due for my shots. I texted my gastroenterologist and she recommended I get blood work to see what was up.

So I went and did and saw what was up, which was that my total white blood cell count and neutrophil (the par…